1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and to a device for a non-traumatic expansion of a bone for receiving fastening and affixing means for dental prosthetics.
2. Brief Description of the Background of the Invention Including Prior Art
The affixing techniques and methods of dental prosthetics consist essentially in the use of the state of the art and methods for integrating and implanting dental replacement elements into the maxillaries. At the present time, the use of these techniques is accepted within a broad field of applications depending on the different techniques or systems to be employed.
Basically, the present known means and devices to perform and carry out a prosthetic implant of a dental configuration, are based to a large degree on the use of osteotomes.
These osteotomes are of the kind of a chisel which perform a required and adequate bone expansion for the placing of an implant, wherein the contact tip of the osteotome is placed on the dental base and the osteotome is introduced into the dental base by tapping the top of the osteotome with a mallet or small hammer and, as the introduction of the osteotome progresses, there results a bone expansion.
The above described technique is the most widely employed method and system at this time for the bone expansion for the placement dental implants. However, this technique is also a traumatic technique and method and, consequently, is accompanied by the disadvantages of this type of technique and method.
Among the most important disadvantages or inconveniences associated with the use of this method are:
Damage to the bone, up to and including breaking and chipping of the bone, as a result of tension created at the dental base with each tap of the mallet or small hammer onto the osteotome. In some instances, a complete deterioration of the dental base can occur, and this deterioration of the dental base requires extensive repairs. PA0 Difficulty in the osteointegration and difficulty in the cohesion based on an incomplete contact between the elements, i.e. the osteotome and bone. PA0 Alignment defect of the fixation axis because the bone expansion can neither be controlled nor adjusted.
Because of these inconveniences, there exists a demand for the development of new means which will reduce the problems associated with the current traumatic techniques and methods.
This type of demand does not only have economical implications in regard to the adoption and development of new techniques, but the evident social connotations in these fields are also to be considered.
A study and development of a device for the expansion of the bone is taught by Wolf and is referred to in the field as the Wolf principle. This principle establishes that the bone is being reshaped as a function of the forces applied to it. Therefore, the bone is a mass which can be expanded, depending on the stimulus required to maintain its form and density.
Numerous techniques are in fact known to obtain a bone expansion or bone enlargement, such as:
grafting onlays PA1 sub-central graftings of the maxillary cavities PA1 graftings related to bone regeneration techniques. PA1 1. Osteoplasty PA1 2. Enlargement for esthetic requirements PA1 3. Narrow implants in lamina form or having a diameter of 3.3 mm PA1 Severe atrophy PA1 Basal bone loss PA1 Plane upper maxillary PA1 Severe bone resorption PA1 Enlargement PA1 Endosteum implants PA1 Subperiostic implants
Enlargement methods of atrophic crests with chisels to provoke "stem fractures" and thereby to widen the bone width have been described.
Hilt Tatan started working in the field of bone expansion and the development of some techniques in the late eighties. Subsequently, it was Dr. Summers who designed cylindrical-conical-shaped instruments which were employed as expansion devices and it was Dr. Summers who called these devices osteotomes.
The present invention is developed with the purpose of overcoming these difficulties and it is planned as an innovative alternative and with advantages for prosthetic implant operations and processes which require a bone expansion in the dental base.